One Tough Pressure

I have a pintle hitch, and drove 25 miles over a bumpy road with it open. Chains and lights were hooked up, as was the break away. When I got to a gas station right before the job and saw it open, I just about passed out. Lucky I only had the front tank filled, and the hitch not level in adjustment. That was a lucky day I now use a lock on the pintle, and store it in the cup holder. If I do not put it on, it will be in the cup holder to remond me to do so.

Goodyear Neptune 4500 psi R2 was my favorite. I only changed as they do not make a 1?2" version.

Moving kinda slow aren't you? I think you need a bigger washer. Or maybe you should lube the cart wheels first.

I was recently shutdown by the County Sheriff for a noise complaint. I asked the deputy if it was the water whoosh or the engine noise and he confirmed the engine. This is an account that I have had for nearly two years and always done at night, and now it is an after 7A.M. on Saturday deal. Today was the first day time cleaning and I am not happy at all. The place is a mad house. Starbucks is across the lot in an adjacent center and all the customers park on my lot which is a serious problem for me. I had to abandon ship and will be back tomorrow for the other half. So aside from dropping the account, what can be done to silence a Honda 20 hp and an Onan 14 hp? I do not beleive a larger muffler would do the trick as the noise is in the high rpm of the air cooled engines. If I were to build insulated panels around the machines or go to an enclosed trailer that is closed up any answer to my prayers? I know they need to be ventilated and that would be done with 12 volt radiator fans. I used to have another guy help me at this place and we had 2 20 hp Hondas & 2 generators going with no problem.

Years later and we are still discussing the same issues. Some things will never change.

What Makes 100%? What does it mean to give MORE than 100%? Ever wonder about those people who say they are giving more than 100%? We have all been to those meetings where someone wants you to give over 100%. How about achieving 103%? What makes up 100% in life? Here's a little mathematical formula that might help you answer these questions: If:A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z is represented as: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26. Then:H-A-R-D-W-O-R-K8+1+18+4+23+15+ 18+11 = 98% andK-N-O-W-L-E-D-G-E11+14+15+23+12+5+4+7+5 = 96%But,A-T-T-I-T-U-D-E!1+20+20+9+20+21+4+5 = 100% And,B-U-L-L- $-H-I-T2+21+12+12+19+8+9+20 = 103% AND, look how far ass kissing will take you.A-$-$-K-I-S-S-I-N-G 1+19+19+11+9+19+19+9+14+7 = 118% So, one can conclude with mathematical certainty that While Hard work andKnowledge will get you close, and Attitude will get you there, it's thebull$hit and A$$ kissing that will put you over the top.

Jon Fleischer and myself had one a few years back. It took alot of calls and emails to find anyone who wanted to go. Most were newbies looking for info, while a few were more established. Jon and I brought our rigs, answered many questions on recovery and had some fun. We only had the one, and I would not say it helped business, or to make new friends. No referrals either. It was a nice event, but the effort put into it is just not worth it for me. No locals from my area would call back, so no networking there either. We had about 15 people and as far as I know, only myself and three others are still in business. Not even the PWNA members in So cal were very interested. 2 brothers that own a hood cleaning place were there. We tried to pitch the PWNA to the others but that did not interest most.

Escaping with a few stitches is great, lucky he did not get hit in the eye. I had a friend that was waiting for his dad to fix his bike. Dad went inside for something and my friend took the bike thinking it was done. When he did a wheelie, the front tire came off, as dad had not finished tightening it up. When my friend came down, the forks hit and screeched to a halt while he went over the bars and plowed into the concrete. 2 black eyes, a broken nose and a fractured arm were his trophy's.

A larger muffler is in no way damaging to an engine. I will have to try the muffler, but I am fairly sure that the real noise is the high rpm. I called the City on this one and the rules are 7Am to 7Pm Mon-Sat. No work at all on Sunday. (Icheated today and worked anyway) Because it is so close to Residential, they do not make any exceptions. I talked to a few store owners in this center and they all said that one guy who lives behind the building has been a complainer since they started building it. He calls the City on everything. The guy sleeps with his window open, and told the Sheriff that if he were to close his window, he probably would not be able to hear the noise, but that he did not feel like closing his window. I was there at 6 AM yesterday, to get everything setup, and prespray. I then sat around waiting for 7Am and turned the key right at 7. I started on the end that this guy lives on just to rattle his windows. Maybe I should take the muffler off just for him. When he gets a taste of that, he will beg for the night crew to come back.

www.shurflo.com

Australian Ghost Story This story happened a while ago in Brisbane, and even though it sounds like an Alfred Hitchcock tale, it's true. John Bradford, a Sydney University student, was on the side of the road hitch hiking on a very dark night and in the midst of a storm. The night was rolling on and no car went by. The storm was so strong he could hardly see a few feet ahead of him. Suddenly he saw a car slowly coming towards him and stopped. John, desperate for shelter and without thinking about it, got in the car and closed the door, just to realize there was nobody behind the wheel and the engine wasn't on! The car started moving slowly. John looked at the road and saw a curve approaching. Scared, he started to pray, begging for his life. Then, just before he hit the curve, a hand appeared through the window and turned the wheel. John, paralyzed with terror, watched how the hand appeared every time they came to a curve. John saw the lights of a pub down the road so, gathering strength, jumped out of the car and ran to it. Wet and out of breath, he rushed inside and asked for two shots of tequila. He then started telling everybody about the horrible experience he went through. A silence enveloped everybody when they realized he was crying and....wasn't drunk. About 15 minutes later, two guys walked into the same pub. They were also wet and out of breath. Looking around and seeing John Bradford sobbing at the bar, one said to the other, "Look, Bruce.. here's the idiot that got in the car while we were pushing it."

The secret is to remove the crayon marks first. Makes life much easier.

I had a 5.2gpm/3500 psi skid that I used to clean the carpets in my house. I installed a high pressure by pass on the extra pump outlet, that when open will send the water back to the tank. I made no unloader adjustments. I then used a standard double bend carpet scrub wand at the end of my hose. The vacuum system is a Sutorbilt 4M blower, so it did just fine for water removal. Prespray was done with a pump up, and the rinse was a citric acid based carpet neutralizer that was ran from my tank. Carpet cleaning varies on pressure, but I was using 500 psi at the wand. Not sure what the gpm at the wand was, but it was pretty low. Bypassing water limits the available water to go thru the burner, which if turned up to high will do damage when it goes steam and you release the wand trigger. Steam Cleaning with a pressure washer is an open gun deal to avoid system overload. In a pinch this will do, but in the long run, It will cost you more per square foot to clean doing it this way.

I used to be a nice guy, but when homeowners fail to be home when they have a job scheduled to be done, I get a little upset. I waited around for a bit after leaving messages on the home phone, and both of their cell phones, and while waiting, some tile setters showed up and set up all their saws and other junk right where I needed to be. Up until now, I have not had any problems with residential work. They have always been home, always paid as soon as the job is done, and have never scheduled other services on my service day. I do not use a contract prior to service. I have a proposal and it spells out all the terms and conditions of the job and what is to be expected by both parties. When I show up for the job, I do a quick review of the terms, remind them to check all windows, and get the pets inside. They then sign the authorization for work and acknowledgement of the terms, and when done, I have them sign for satisfactory completion of work. After today, all work will be signed for at estimate time, and a cancellation fee wil be applied unless they notify me 24 hours prior. If I show up, and they are not home, I will charge them a yet to be determined percentage of the job cost. Need to see what is legal before I set my dollar amount. And three hours after the job time, they still have not called me back. Bums.

John, I have to say, that going in and closing the windows myself never came to mind. Not a bad idea, but could also backfire if people want to be jerks. Balázs, If I were to encounter a car in a parking lot I am cleaning, then I would go around and not think twice, but residential is different, at least for me. The guy called back on Sunday and wanted to reschedule for that day. He offered to pay more before I could say anything, but I politely declined without even asking or telling him what the upcharge would be. I have my limits with some people. He wanted a spot asap, that could not be delivered. He then settled on my next available date only to call back 10 minutes later and cancel.I love my repeat commercial accounts.

Not your new one I hope.

If it were the gardener or the pool guy, no big deal as they are so fast. However when it is a tile crew that will be there for hours, it is a problem. The tile guys had keys and were in the house when I went back to the door. I asked them if the homeowners were there and got a blank stare and a few non english words. I make it clear to folks that I get the exclusive on job day. I had the house to wash and the driveway. there was a suv in there and I could see windows that were not fully closed. When I do residential, the folks are usually home. I only do high end residential, so these folks can be home whenever they want.

I learned that the hard way, on the job. Now I always have a spare racor filter with me.

I have an elbow from the bulkhead to the hudson. The front tank was already drilled from the side, so when I added the rear plumbing, I did it the same. When the valves fail, I can shut off the water. They all fail after awhile. I even use the larger 1" hi temp ones and they still go out. Not sure why I even bother anymore. I added all the ball valves, so I could fill either tank. The one on the right went to a small float tank on the skid, but when i went 8 gpm, I diconnected the tank, but kept the line to use for misc items when needed. Works nice to daisy chain machines off one spigot and to fill chem jugs, wash hands, etc.

You can put it anywhere that you can install a bulkhead fitting. That way it has good support. I like my tanks full, so i have mine very close to the top. I use rectangular tanks, but that makes no difference. Here is a pic of my bulkheads and ball valves. The Hudson Floats are on the other side of the bulks.

Pressure drop on a 3/8" hose at 100 feet on a 5 gpm machine is 130 psi. The drop on that same hose with an 8 gpm is 300 psi. So with 150 feet of 3/8" hose on an 8pm washer, you can expect a 450 psi drop. That drop is from hose alone and does not count the unloader, coil, hose reel and so on.

At least John included a Ford in his pics, and not another Dodge.

If one must use an inverter, then why not have it hooked up to the washer battery? At least it gets a constant charge while the machine is running.

Shawn, After 3 years of use, you can readily expect the machine to lose pressure in one way or another. As Ken said, it may be as simple as a worn nozzle, but you may also have leaks in a hose or connection, a clogged filter if you use the hp ones, a worn unloader, slipping belts, or low engine rpm.

Chris, How long can you use the inverter before you have to start the truck? I would not want my truck running while I am out washing.